Saturday a.m. in Nanchang

Hi - it's Lisa here. Chal and Kyle are off to buy more baby food for our plane ride today. We leave around Noon, the plane leaves around 1:40 p.m. and then we arrive in Guangzhou around 3:30 today and at the hotel at 5:30 or so. Should be fun, since Kyle likes to eat alot now and we will be eating out of our backpack today for a bit. Everyone is ready to get to Guangzhou to have more food variety, including American food. I have still been on bread and water now for 3 days -- my advice to everyone is "don't get ice cubes ever in Nanchang!!" Supposedly, they should have been purified, but I have felt horrendous each day.

Yesterday, we took a walk down the street in the afternoon. When we were taking a picture of the lotto store for Aunt Mary (to show her the numbers here), a guy ran out of the store next door and started practicing his English on us. He told us that "Nanchang is a very nice city." He understood that we were from the US, but he didn't know where PA was. He was proud to have his picture taken with Kyle. Of course, he tried to hold his hand, so he and Charlie are smiling in the picture, while Kyle is wailing. At the same time, we attracted a mini crowd around us to look at the baby. The elderly are especially interested in him. It is customary to stare here in China (unlike the US) so people will stare at you for a long time and even turn around.

On our walk, too, we went by a river with raw sewage pumping right into it. Totally disgusting but 2 people were fishing right in the water. The air pollution here is probably similar to LA but more yellow. God knows what might be in the air. The hotel windows are covered with something and there is a musty, mold smell in the room (this is a 4 star hotel in China!) Hopefully, the White Swan will be a little better.

We had another pizza party last night and they ran the movie "Cars" for the kids. When they turned the lights off, Kyle decided that it was okay to talk and sing out because no one could see him in the dark. It was funny. I don't think he was interested in the movie, but he did like the pizza and he was ready for a coke (although he did not get that!) He is a little food hound.

He was funny yesterday; he decided that sometimes it is okay for me to touch him but Daddy must be right next to us at the same time. He tends to cry lots of crocodile tears so that Daddy picks him up and holds him. Last night, he was showing us his dancing skills -- he can do the twist from a sitting position. He does not want to crawl nor will he turn over, so he either sits, lays or stands. He can walk pretty fast (to Daddy) if I hold his hands at the same time. He is definitely a very deep sleeper. He has been napping several times during the day and then will go for around 11 hrs. at night -- we call him Baby Rip Van Winkle.

Our group is like "Robeez Shoes" central - each baby has a different kind on. It's really funny. Some parents have bought their little girls the "squeeky shoes" that make noise when you walk on them. It makes the babies walk faster.

In case Charlie didn't tell you (as I didn't page back through all of the postings), we had a little outfit made for him at the laundry a few days ago. It's a hat, shoes, top and bottoms. We'll see if he wears it! We hope to get at least part of it on for New Year's tomorrow.

Hope everyone is well -- Kyle saw some little dogs yesterday, so he was interested in those (he had never seen them before). Hopefully, Murphy is behaving himself on his little vacation!!

Also, I mistakenly told you that our guide, Kathy, was from Hunan. She is from Hubei (little translation issue on my part!) In case you are checking out the sites on Google.

Talk to you later from Guangzhou --- Love, Lisa, Charlie & Kyle

More Pictures...I posted the last message mistakenly...

Cut me a break...all the menu choices are in Chinese!!!
Here's more...

Kyle and Dad around Town in Nanchang

Kyle and his Amazing Stacking Cups!

At the Teng Wang Pavilion, after ringing the Good Luck Bell

Kyle & Mom with his new Passport

(...looks like he's none too please with the photo...)

Kyle & His Knotty Blanket

(look out the window behind Kyle - it's the middle of the day, if you can believe it!! Smog much...)

Kyle, being Kyle.

Kyle & Dad at the Pavilion.

That's it for now. Have a good night.

We'll check in again from Guangzhou!

Charlie

I've got the camera now...

Hi all,





It's Friday evening ALREADY (after an unbelievably fast week), and we check out in the AM. From here (Nanchang) we head to Guangzhou, about a 1 hour plane ride. Kyle's (and the other babies') first - should be an adventure.





It seems like we just got here. We've had an enjoyable stay here in Nanchang. The people have all been very friendly and respectful. They are interested in us and the babies and when they like to stop and speak with us. Even though we rarely understand each others' languages on the street, we're usually able to communicate. Many people (usually oler women) like to say "lucky baby" when they see us, we think it just the opposite - we're the lucky ones.





We picked up Kyle's passport today at a different Government office - it was a very interesting ride and we saw areas we had not seen before. Later, after Kyle's nap #1 and nap#2, Lisa patiently sat through a 90 minute paperwork-signing session for us. Kyle and I tried to keep occupied watching Shrek 2 on HBO and cathing up on the highlights (Words in Chinese but Pictures in English!) of this week's Premier League Matches (English soccer for those of you in Rio Linda).





Kyle and Lisa are both asleep in the room and I'm (you guessed it) in the Business Center. He's worn out from a full day. It seems like Feng Aitao is slowly leaving us and Kyle Lockhead is arriving. He's beginning to come out of his shell more and more. Lisa's still not feeling well - I'm sure tonight's Pizza Hut meal (3rd time this week) was probably ill-advised. But they were playing the DVD movie "Cars" through a PC and an LCD projector on a big screen, and we wanted to enjoy everyone's company so we joined in the Pizza party.





I'll use the rest of the time tonight with uploading some picutres from our past couple of days. Enjoy...

Lisa & Charlie @ the Great Wall (BK: Before Kyle)

Update for Thursday Night

Hi all,

I don't know about you all, but Lisa and I were just saying how quickly this trip was moving. It's hard to believe that it's already been a week. But, oh what a week. I will say that this exercise of posting some of our activities and goings-on has been good for me as a way to recall many of the details myself and I think this will strengthen the memories of this trip. On the other hand, Lisa's been very good about writing entries into our Travel Journal in longhand form, so we'll have that as a record for Kyle as well. (I'll likely print this Weblog out or save it in some sort of electronic format so we'll have this for him, as well.

Local time here in Nanchang is Thursday evening @ 8:22PM.

We've just finished our dinner here in the hotel restaurant. It's the best bet around for Western style food. Lisa has been sick most of the day and is resting now in the room. (It's something that has also been affecting some others in our travel group. Lisa (from Oklahoma City), Heather (from Spokane, WA) and Mark (from around Atlanta, GA) were all down with similar symptoms, some worse than others. Kyle is down for the night as well. Dinner was fine, Kyle was good and had his usual good appetite. The dish of the day for him was prunes - lets just say they worked. (If you're keeping score or following along with the home version, Pupu #2 has been accomplished). I'm in the hotel business center again, unfortunately without the camera, I forgot to bring it along. Hopefully I'll be able to finish this before being given the bum's rush out at closing time.

It was a slower day than normal. This morning we went to THE Nanchang Tourist / Local Cultural spot. It's called the Teng Wang Pavilion.
Here are a couple of links (I can't test them because of the communications / earthquake problem, So I hope they work:
http://www.china-travel-tour-guide.com/attractions/prince-teng-pavilion.shtml
http://www.travelchinaguide.com/attraction/jiangxi/nanchang/tengwang.htm

We had about 2 hours to tour the main pavilion. We had planned on seeing a dance performance but we could not since the stage was under repair (maybe next time ;-)). We rode the elevator to the top floor and walked down an visited each floor. Each floor had different exhibits and gift shops, and the higher floors had all-around outdoor access so you could get a nice view of the city, the river, and the large suspension bridge. The smog/pollution is exceptionally bad here and many of the views were just, how you say, not good. It's like looking through a set of binoculars that have not been cleaned or wearing a pair of glasses after coming back in to a warn house from the cold.

Anyway the pavilion was a nice trip, we got a lot of nice pictures and some video. I rang a huge Good luck bell. It cost me 10 Yuan so I better be really lucky! Kyle slept most of the time we walked around - the boy can sleep through anything. Afterward, we relaxed around the hotel, and Kyle and I checked out the lobby areas while Lisa got a nap in.

He's getting a little better with Lisa and actually let her touch him this afternoon. I know it tough so we work on it every day. We've also been giving Kyle mini workouts to build up his muscles - he doesn't seem to mind. Mostly crunches, squats and sit ups. We'll work on push-ups when his neck is stronger. But I would not be surprised at all if he goes right to walking and skips crawling.

We got our second load of laundry back from the local laundry.. we even got a bonus - 2 shirts that were not ours!!! Luckily I caught the delivery girl before she left our floor on the way out! If we got someone else's shirts, I hope someone ales didn't get something of ours? Oh well, that the risk of using local laundry (not the hotel's). I suppose we're lucky, Rob and Shelly (Ames, Iowa) dropped off their laundry at a different place and when it came back it had all been dry cleaned!! Shelly said it took them about 20 minutes to get all of the safety pins (used to track the clothes, I suppose) out of all of their clothes!

So that's been our day. Tomorrow we do more paperwork and need to go to the Civil Affairs Office to pick up the babies' passports. This should be interesting, since this is where the Gotchas happened. I'll be curious to see their reactions.

Our travel group is filled with great people always willing to try to do whatever they can to help others. Several asked if they could do anything to help with Kyle since Lisa was not feeling well. I'm sure we'll be keeping in touch with many of these families. Kyle will be memorable for them since he's the only boy in this group. (In a couple of days we'll be meeting up with another couple who have adopted twin 2-year-old boys. We met them in Beijing and they went to their province separately. That should be a lot of fun.

That's about it for now...please feel free to post comments since we're out of e-mail contact. There is no telling when it will be restored.

We enjoy reading all of your comments as well - so please keep them coming.

Have a good night/day,
C

Short Update - Communications Problems

Hi again from Kyle and Charlie,

Kyle says:

c f .,, m sxxxx jyhyfc vcx gum,,.,//>22xcjndc nporofkde709rmjdfjkkfddlo

Charlie says:

The earthquake has apparently knocked out a major communications link between here and the mainland USA.

We can get to Google to post updates here, but we have NO access to AOL email.
So we're not ignoring you, we just can't get there from here...

Sorry for the short post, but we'll have an update later tonight...

See ya for now...
C

Thursday a.m. here in Nanchang

Hello - this is Lisa now trying out the blog for the first time, with Baby Kyle and Charlie sitting next to me. Kyle is Charlie's third arm so he has to be stuck to him 24/7!! We get up early here around 6 to start our day. We just finished breakfast. Kyle is a HUGE eater so he has that going for him. He really doesn't like bottles and water but he'll eat eggs, toast, oranges, watermelon. Last night, we had a group pizza party with everyone, so of course, he had to have pizza. That was after having a taste of the Oriental style of Oreos in the afternoon (they don't taste like U.S. Oreos and they are about the size of a quarter!)

For those of you emailing us, aol.com must be now "blocked" from our accessing it due to possible cultural content reasons, so we haven't been able to read any emails from the hotel in 2 days. If we still can't read them tonight, we may go to the local internet cafe. Of course, it is hard because Kyle has to be with Charlie the ENTIRE time, so we will have to go as a family!!!!

We had a very interesting experience yesterday afternoon. Kathy and Michelle, our guides, took us to the local Chinese farmer's market. You would not believe what we saw - one man was cutting up worms (yes, huge worms); there were entire fish heads laying around, there were pig heads (entire pig heads), pig feet, pig livers, pig brains, eels and all kinds of vegetables. Kyle totally perked up with all of the smells and sounds. There wasn't a ton of refrigeration either (a little ice). We took lots of pictures. Again, it was hilarious with about 35 of us (Americans) parading through and flashing all kinds of pictures in the market. Most of the locals smile and point and talk rapidly at us. Several told Kyle that he has "huge eyes." Several of the older Chinese women got very upset with 2 babies as they didn't have any shoes on. Remember, that here, they like them dressed in 20 layers at all times with no skin showing at all. Yesterday, it actually got quite cold and windy here, too. I think that the Beijing weather is following us, as the other days had been so mild. It was really foggy here, too.

Our guides are very interesting people. Our lead guide, Kathy, is from Hunan Province. She is married with 1 5 yr. old son and they live with her parents. She said that a friend of hers told her to join GWCA to help out because she knows "how to take care of children" and "she has a nice smile." She has been working for them for about 2 yrs. now. She is an independent contractor who does both local work in Hunan and then comes here to the Province. She is fluent in her own Hunan dialect and then in Mandarin (the dialect spoken here). She knows a ton about the local culture, too, and is very caring. Kathy travels to Beijing on a 4 hr. train ride, when she comes this way.

Our second guide, Michelle, is on her first training session with Great Wall. She is from Xian (home of the Terra Cotta warriors); I told her that I had seen those on "Amazing Race" but she didn't know about that TV show. She has been with GWCA only a few months, and had been helping special needs children in Xian before this. She said that the Northern Provinces, like Xian, are more conservative than the southern provinces (like Jiangxi) and that the northern provinces only really allow the adoption of special needs children at this time. That's why many of the healthy adopted children are only coming from southern China now. She also is fluent in her own dialect and in Mandarin. Both of them sound very different, as the dialects are all so different. They are always asking about all of the children and making sure that everyone is doing okay.

Our group is very diverse - they are from all over the U.S. and we have several children traveling with us too, due to the holidays. They all get along very well and everyone is extremely nice and caring. Kyle is the only boy. Last night, he had two girls crawling towards him and he really wanted none of that!! He only wanted to hug Daddy. He will allow one of the other mothers to touch him. Many of the babies are bonding quickly with their brothers and sisters, maybe because they are closer in size. It's funny to see how different all of the children are - some are crawling, some suck thumbs, one is already potty trained. Kyle is probably going to skip crawling and go to walking. He grows a little stronger each day as we make him walk a little, sit up, feed himself.

It was funny post our pizza party last night. Kyle went to bed around 8 p.m. and was talking up a storm. We couldn't understand what he was saying but he was talking and talking. He also goes to bed every night listening to the Vince Giraldi Christmas tunes (basically, Snoopy's Christmas songs!) He is swimming in some of his clothes so they are all rolled up -- big head and a petite little body!!! With the way he is eating, he should catch up very soon. Clothes are cheap here, too. I got a little rugby type sweater at Walmart for a whopping $7.00.

Today, we are headed to the site to see in Nanchang. A big temple of some sort. Then we'll probably walk a bit around the streets near the hotel this afternoon. It's pretty claustrophobic to stay in our room, as we only get HBO (one channel) and then everything else is in Chinese. We also don't have access to any Western news (are you surprised?!) nor any Western papers, so we have absolutely no idea what is going on in the world right now - it's a strange feeling. Our guides are familiar with the internet, so they must read some news there.

We are going to go upstairs now and get ready for our big day -- Mommy will be the sherpa and Daddy will be the Baby Carrier.

Most of the pictures that you will see of Kyle's adventures in China today have little grimace faces!!! It should be interesting to look back on these in the future, with all of his little frowns. He is also the one wailing in everyone's Gotcha Day video -- !!!!

Talk to you all later -- have a great day. Love, Lisa & Charlie

Checking in on Wednesday Night / Morning...

Hi All,

We hope everyone's had a wonderful Christmas. We missed a day so I try to catch up with the events of the week in Nanchang.

It seems that Kyle has attached more to me than Lisa for the moment and he cries loudly whenever he loses sight of me. We're trying to work on that but it is very difficult to overcome, escpecially as early on. He walked around the neighborhood the other day in Lisa's arms just fine - the picture from my last post shows that. We'll keep working on it.

Yesterday we went to a Super Wal-Mart here in Nanchang (about 2 miles from the hotel). We traveled in a large group by bus and most everyone went, so you can imagine the scene of 35 westerners (the only ones for miles, I'm sure!!) parading through the street on the way to Wal-Mart, many clutching their new babies! The Wal-Mart was unusual in that it was in the upper 2 stories of a 3-story building on a major corner near a large public square in town. For the Philly followers, it would be like a bus pulling up on Independence Mall and everyone parading into a building not unlike the Bourse (except a little newer!). Anyway, inside it was all Wal-Mart, and except for the Chinese signs and product packaging, mostly indistinguishable from one in the USA.

Inside, on the upper floor, Kyle and I manned the cart while Lisa picked up a few staples and some nice new clothes for our son. We rode the escalator (with our cart) down to the Checkout/Food floor. It was a huge grocery store with every manner of Food and drink - including fresh fish (in tanks so you could pick out what you wanted) and 2 types of Turtles (for Soup). And of course they had fresh live Frogs for ... don't ask.

We checked out, and met at the KFC restaurant inside the Wal-Mart. We rode the bus home and spent he afternoon in the room. Kyle seems to have a temperature and had not had a well, uhh, how you say, pupu, since we got him, so we were a little worried. Our wonderful guide Cathy checked Kyle gave use some advice and helped us out by giving us some Chinese tea for babies to help Kyle make pupu. He, in fact, did by the next morning so that's really all we need to say about that.

We ate dinner in the hotel and had a faily nice meal. After dinner, we strolled the lobby and sat for a while and listened to a piano player.

I may have mentioned this, but we also got the pictures developed from the disposable cameras we had sent over to Kyle's orphanage. They show him motoring in his walker all over the orphanage inside in the halls and outside around the Courtyard. This may be why he's so unsteady - he's getting stronger every day. He's noticably more stady when he sits and plays syacking cups. They also have some pictures of his crib, and the surrounding cribs (several of them). He had the opportunity to have had lots of close attention from his nanny (she's been with the orphanage for many years. She was (and still is) sad that Kyle has left, and we've been told that she misses him very much. We've agreed to send pictures of Kyle as he grows up back to her so she can see the progress that he makes.

Kyle has a very healthy appetite, and still enjoys mandarin oranges, rice congee and watermelon. He's seems like

he'll try anything. He can even polish off Gerber biscuits by himself, holding them quite well and breaking off bite-sized pieces with his teeth. He's starting bto be much more vocal, and even keeps himself occupied with a personal conversations in his crib as he soothes himself to sleep. He's a very sound sleeper, but if he woke up while I was here in the hotel business center and not in the room, Lisa would have to bring him down so he could see me. This would not be a goos situation for anyone, so let's hope I don't have to type that I see them headed this way across the hotel lobby!!!

Today (Wednesday) was another pretty good day. We didn't have any paperwork to do so Cathy had some sightseeing planned for us here in town. In the AM, we went to a popular local park for a morning walk. It was quite a bit colder today and windy also at the park. We needed our coats and even put Kyle in his winter coat.

The park was very nice and we had a good time. There was a Taoist temple there that we had the chance to walk through. Here are some photos:

It seems the business Center is closing down at 10:35 - so I'm being kicked off. I'll try again later.

Sorry so short tonight...I'll catch up.

Good night.

C

Merry Christmas!!!

Hi all,

Another great day in Nanchang, Jiangxi Province, China!

Today was filled with lots of good stuff so let's get right to it.

We started out with a trip back to the Civil Affairs Office to "register" (finalize) the adoptions for our group. It was a slam dunk - the interview was very short and to the point. The officer asked us a few basic questions like "Will you never abuse or abandon your child?" I won't bore you with the others, but you get the idea. We paid sone $, and then we all went to the notay office for an even shorter interview. We were back at the hotel before noon.

We had both breakfast and lunch at the hotel and had a good time with Kyle on both occasions. He REALLY likes mandarin oranges (I think I may have mentioned this...). So he ate well and he had oranges, watermelon, and some rice congee (a thick soup) for both meals.

Kyle is the only one in our travel group from the Fengcheng SWI orphanage, se we got a chance to meet the Director of his orphanage and his assistant. They were very nice. Lisa brought a big bag of clothes to donate for the other children and the Director was very appreciative.

After lunch we went for a walk around the neighborhood near the hotel. It's very safe and the Chinese are very friendly. We got a lot of stares (perfectly normal) and several Chinese people stopped us to see Kyle. We dropped some laundry off at the Laundry next to the grocery store from yesterday. The girls at the laundry were very friendly and spoke English well. We bought a traditional Chinese outfit for Kyle (custome made and hand sewn - after we picked the fabric). It was made up up a coat pants, shoes and a hat. The pattern is a red one with a dragon motif. They told us the suit would be ready tomorrow - but within about 4 hours, they had already dropped of the coat and pants to our room! We'll get the shoes and hat tomorrow with our finished laundry.

Also on our walk, we dropped off the (2) disposable cameras that Lisa arranged to have sent over. These were for the caretakers and nannies to use to take Kyle shots at the orphanage. We'll pick those up tomorrow as well - I got digital output so we'd have the chance to post them.

We actually saw the first smile from Kyle earlir today - Lisa was playing with him and got him to crack the smallest of grins. In this process, you have to take yourvictories when you can.

We found out from some of the questions and answers that even though he was at an orphanage, Kyle was actually cared for by the same person his whole life. This explains some of the separation anxiety he's feeling. She was also very sad that he was leaving, and is still sad. We promised to send photos to her as Kyle gets older. They told us that Kyle was pretty much spolied (with all of the personal attention he got from the dedicated nanny). He still gets upset when changing holders or when things change too quickly. He's still very shy with strangers. He cries when he needs to be changed. Sometimes he likes to walk so long as someone is holding his hands, and he does not crawl much. He'll need to hit the Gym and strengthen his entire body!

Her are a couple more uplaods.

I've gotta roll. Thanks for tuning in.. we now return you to your regularly sheduled program.

C

PS - Big day tomorrow - going to the huge Chinese Walmart here in town!! Oh Yeah!!!

Gotcha Day!!! Merry Christmas!!!

Good evening/morning everyone,

Today has been a long day - just like BIG days in Life tend to be.

It's Christmas Eve here in Nanchang, and we're settling in for the night.

So first, we wish everyone checking in a very Merry Christmas.

We arrived early here in Nanchang after rising at 5AM & catching our flight from Bejing.

We had some free time and then Kathy took us shopping at a Chinese grocery near the hotel.

This was an experience - we got some bottled water, and some snacks that weren't quite what we expected.

The weather here is very mild and today was actually quite nice with temps in the the 50's by my estimation.

We are excited to report that Gotcha Day has brought our son Kyle safely to us!

At around 2:30 this afternoon we went by bus to the Civil Affairs Office.

When we got to the Gotcha Room, we saw Kyle sitting off to the side with his escorts.

He has been driven by Bus about 90 minutes from his orphanage.

He looked a lot like his photos, and was dressed in a traditional Chinese red outfit.

He was escorted by a woman and man along with an official of the provincial government form the area of the orphanage. We're not sure who these people were and we'll try to find out tomorrow.

We've got a lot of pictures and some video, so I'll include a picute or two here, but will probably share the rest of the photos separately.

When first got to hold him, he wasn't as enthisiastic about the idea as we were. In fact, it wasn't pretty!!!

He cried a lot and wanted to go back to be held by his Nanny/Helper. He seemed to be quite attached. It was a little difficult for us at first, but we knew what to expcect and knew also that this might be a possibility. Nonetheless, we Gotcha'd him and he cried quite loudly the rest of the afternoon, until we were able to get him home and get him changed. He seemed better after that.

The rest of our group did well. The little girls in our group did very well, except for one or two, who cried. Kyle was clearly the most vocal - no wonder since he was so grossly outnumbered! Lisa tried to get some pictures of the other little girls so we'll have that for later.

The whole "ceremony" didn't take but 45 minutes and then we were on our bus back to the hotel.

Once back in the room Kyle got progressively better, and seems much more interested in us. After his diaper change, he and I hung out while Lisa did some of the local Nanchang papaerwork. It seems that Kyle is a whiz at stacking cups. He enjoys the sight & sound of the TV, and he also likes his "Knotty Blanket". His hand eye coordination seems very good and he had no problem understanding the cup-in-a-cup concept. He caught on quickly. He also found out that he could make noise by banging his cups together!

As expected he doesn't walk and doesn't seem able to crawl much yet either. We'll further test that theory tomorrow. He is a bit of a peanut for being 15 mos, but does seem to have a good number of teeth. He hasn't eaten much and will be hungry in the morning.

After Lisa returned, we gave him a bath. He seems to be OK with this and liked to splash around with his feet. The hotel gave us a small baby wash tub for him, which worked fine. We also have a small crib for the room. I'll have to report on this tomorrow.

After his bath, Lisa played more stacking cups with him while I went to fill out paperwork (lots of signatures and lots of red-ink thumbprints).

Right now he's sleeping comfortably on the bed. When I sign off, we'll try to place him in the crib. This should be fun!!

I guess that's it for now. Sorry for making you read all of the story before we got to the pictures.

Here's the moment we've all been waiting for!!!!!

Kyle:

Master of Stacking Cups

Again, Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night.

C

We're Here! (con't again)...

Sorry about that...had to pay more money to someone who can't understand a word I said, for some amout of time that I can't understand! Welcome to the other side of the planet.

Where was I...?
Oh yeah... the Smog!
Not bad in the AM, but got progressively worse throughout the morning. Hi-rises visible earlier in the day faded as the day wore on. I felt like I had to cough, but didn't because the sensation was bothersome but not strong enough to force a cough. I'ts actually a l ot like the air in here right now!

We stopped for lunch at a Restaurant/Choissel (sp?) gift shop. (We picked up a neat gift for Kyle.) Lunch was Lisa's first tangle with authentic Chinese food. Well mostly authentic, except for the French Fries. She did well and scratched together enough stuff for a meal. We'd need the enery for the Great Wall was our next stop.

(As I look around the net bar, I'd like to up my estimate to 200+ as I didn't see the other rooms! Lots of young people really into their games...Communist Schmomunist!)

Kathy gave us a really interesting briefing on the way to our visit to the Great Wall. Truly a wonder of the world. Many in our travel group braved the difficult side of the wall near our tour spot (this a very steep climb, with uneven footing, steps of varying heights, and no landings between the guard towers at which to rest.) Not for the faint of heart. Got more great pictures here as well - almost burned through our 3rd battery.

I'll be signing off now, since tomorrow is GotchaDay for Kyle and all the rest of the children for our group. I think I know what to expect. Who am I kidding - we'll be winging it!!!

Our flight was moved up so we had to pack and store our checked luggage by 8:30PM. So we'll all be equally stale tomorrow morning at 6:20 AM when we need to be on board the bus for the airport. We fly Bejing to Nanchang in the morning and then we head to the Civil Affairs office for the Gotchas.

Nervous? Sure we are.
Ready? Never been more ready for anything in our lives.

(In case we don't have a chance to post...As tomorrow is Christmas Eve, we wish all of you following along at home a very Merry Christmas. We miss you and can't wait to make our next post - hopefully with Pictures.)

Good night - I mean, good morning.
C

We're Here (con't)...

I'm back...

In the AM we met up with the rest of our group and headed out on our tour bus, with Kathy at the rudder.

This morning we got to see Tienanmen (sp?) Square and the Forbidden City.
The Square was jammed with lots of tourists and local as well. We got lots of pictures.
(Unfortunately I'm unable to post as I don't have a CPU to access. Soon enough hopefully.)

The FC was just unbelievable - much more impressive than I'd imagined. Kathy was great at telling the stories of the Dynasties and how the city reflected like in that day. We saw many palaces within the FC, each one more interesting than the last. We burned through 2 camera batteries just in the morning.

(I'll be right back - gotta go pay more money...)

Finally a chance to make contact! We're Here!

Hi everyone,

We made it. We are here in Bejing and we made it on time, whatever day it was when we got here.
So Noel, Joanne, Charlie & Rita take a deep breath, we're good to go...

It's Saturday night here and I come to you from a net bar near the hotel. It's jammed with gamers, and is in the basement of what looks to be an office building. I am one of 2 Americans among the 120 or so that are here. Row after row of flat screen monitors, no light lots of smoke, and lost of chatter. It's difficult to describe...It's like something out of a movie. It only took about 5 minutes to communicate with the cashier, and another 10 to log all the way in.

Let me start again...We made our journey here pretty much on time and in good shape. The Bus. Class upgrade was the way to go - unbelieveable difference. PHL to Detroit was smooth (Lisa got us FC on this leg.) In Detroit, we were able to hang out in the Worldclass Club. It was really a nice break from terminal fast food. They had a great selection of snacks, drinks (incl. beer, wine & liquor), fresh fruit, comfortable chairs and a TV to kill time. We relaxed for about 90 minutes before heading to our gate.

Detroit to Tolyo was long but bearable due to seats, meals, and entertainment options. Fairly current movies on a personal entertainment unit, and a running view of the flight's progress. This got old really quickly - not unlike to monotony of seeing EVERY mile marker on the PA & Ohio Turnpikes on the trip from Philly to East Grand Rapids.

After landing on Tokyo, we had about 30 minutes to make our connection, which we did. The flight is a bit of a blur still. The most memorable thing was the layer of smog that was apparent on approach to Bejing airport.

Luckilywe made it off the plane quickly (because of the BC seats) - but that really didn't matter since the wait at Chinese customs took about 40 minutes anyway. Baggage was when we got there and we sailed through the last checkpoint.

We met up with the 3 other families in our group, and our guide Kathy and hit the hotel - just like the itinerary.

Today was a great day...(see the next post for more details since the server here at the net bar seems to be a little nervous and jerky)...

Gotta be Quick - the meter's running

Hi all,

I've got 20 minutes for my money, so I'll be brief (can't be too worried about spelling)?

Thanks to little sis, we're safely ensconced here at the airport Marriot in PHL.
Leave in the AM - early.

Excitement's building, and hopefully the bad weather & dealys in Denver won't affect us.
Although the hotel seems to be very busy at check-in...?

Thanks again to everyone.
Have a good niight - perhaps I can post from Denver between flights from their NW Airlines lounge on Thursday.

C

Final Preparations and Last Minute Changes

Hi everyone,

We've completed our pre-packing trial #2, and everything seems to fit. Everything that needs to fit, that is.

The paperwork has been copied, collated, organized, re-collated, and re-checked. We'll hit the hay tonight knowing that we're as ready as we can be to leave on our odyssey tomorrow evening. Then it's wheels up at 9:14 AM on Thursday.

Through some good detective work and a lot of persistence Lisa (with Joanne's help - THANKS!!!) was able to score us Business Class Seats at a reasonable price. Here's a snapshot:

These are sweet seats, almost full degree recline, lumbar support, and entertainment center. This will make the trip much more enjoyable. Especially on the return with Kyle, who'll need to park on our laps for 14 hours!
No worries, we've waited over 2 years to make this trip.

Anyway, seems like we're in good shape.

This may be my last post for a little while, depending on how our timing goes tomorrow evening, so just a few words of thanks are in order.

To our families, immediate and extended: Thanks for all of the encouragement and support every step of the way. Your kind wishes helped us through all of the weeks and months of "no news yet..."

To all of our friends, local in Harleysville and far-flung as well: thanks for asking if there's anything you could do - and meaning it. Thanks to the Duffys for sharing their home with us the other night, it wasn't planned that way, but it gave us a great chance to see all of our friends before we leave. (And the food and drink were excellent as always!)

To the folks looking after our own family while we're gone: We really appreciate Liz and Charlie taking such good care of our two cats Mocha and Misty. We can rest so much easier knowing the caring attention that they're getting. Thanks also to Grandmom & PopPop Lockhead and Aunt Mary for spoiling, I mean "looking after" Murphy. The Murph has been the best practice possible to prep for Kyle. Seriously - we're very grateful.

Just a final note if I could...please say a quick prayer tonight or tomorrow for my Dad, he's going in for what we all hope will be a quick procedure on Wednesday morning. All the indicators are green and we're all hopeful for an excellent outcome. We'll be thinking of you.

And Lisa and I will be thinking of all of you as we set out for the far side of the planet to experience a little taste of our son's world for a few weeks.

We look forward to sharing as much of it as we are able to.

Cheers and good night for now.
C

PS For Malissa, Justin, Alyx and Sean Andrew, you can follow our flight from Detroit to Tokyo on http://flightaware.com/ (or another flight tracking website). It's Northwest Flight # 25, Departing Detroit on Thursday at 1:45PM (local time in Detroit). The flight goes over the North Pole, so if it's clear, we should be able to see Santa's workshop. He should be getting ready to load up the sleigh soon - We'll let you know what we see.

Early Christmas (Part II)

Good evening all,

Once again we've had the good fortune to share a touch of early Christmas - this time with the Lockhead Family in Philadelphia.

Thank you to Charlie's Mom & Dad and Aunt Mary for all their great gifts for us and for Kyle. Thanks also to Aunt Rita and Uncle Sean & Laura, and to Alyx and Sean Andrew. We really appreciate everything.

Kyle's going to have a blast with his new toys and he'll look mighty spiffy in his new duds.

Thanks for the send-off as well. We'll be thinking of you all.

Early Christmas

We would like to say Hi again, and a huge Thank You to Noel & Joanne (Lisa's M&D).

Normally, at Christmastime, Lisa and I (and our 4-legged crew) travel out to East Grand Rapids, Michigan to spend the Holidays with the Wedders. It's normally a great time to visit with everyone and to get away and enjoy some downtime from our real lives. Since, as we all know, this is not a normal year, we won't have the pleasure of making this trip.

So that we wouldn't miss out, the Wedders generously sent all of their gifts ahead so we could have the fun of opening them early before we left. It was an early Christmas treat, to say the least. (Keep in mind, that during a normal year I (Charlie) would just be getting started with my Christmas shopping!) Anyway...

Lisa & I just opened all of their presents just a few moments ago. All of the gifts were wonderful. Thanks for everything. Needles to say, Kyle made out like a bandit. He'll be very pleased with all of the puzzles, books, toys, and especially with the Riding Rocking Lion with real-life roar.


How Cool is this!!!




Thanks so much for everything.


We'll have more details soon.







Signing off for now.
Good night all.

We Have Ignition! - TRAVEL AUTHORIZATION is APPROVED!!!

Today would be a VERY GOOD Day.

Heather at Great Wall informed us that our T/A was APPROVED, and our Appointment at the American Consulate in Guangzhou was CONFIRMED.

As for our travel arrangements & flights -- Book 'em Danno!!

Pending several approvals, "Gotcha Day" is looking like Christmas Day, Dec. 25, 2006!

Things have been very exciting around here...alternately euphoric and highly stressful.
Our "Stress-o-meter" actually broke in the last fracas so we need to get a new one. Keep this in mind for a Christmas gift for us. I think if you order before Friday at Midnight, you get a free Bamboo Steamer, Ginsu Knife Set, or Clapper (your choice...).

We'll keep everyone posted on the details.
Film at 11.

Posting Comments...

To those who are so inclined, feel free to post any comments you'd like.
But keep in mind, you need to create a Google account to do so.
Just follow the instructions...it's easy.
Thanks for stopping by.

Later,
Charlie

Quick Update

When last we had substantial news, we were one of (11) groups that did not receive out TA.
The reason: The gentleman who is responsible for signing off on the TA's was called out of the office and had to travel on business.

We got word today from our agency that Director Lu is BACK ! ! !
Trust me...this is a good thing.

We may possible receive our TA early next week.
Travel Plans follow quickly thereafter!

In what could be a sign of good things to come, we got our passports back complete with Chinese Visas!!!
Now we're locked & loaded for travel, and only need our TA.


Soon enough...












Thanks for stopping by.
Big shopping weekend approaching - need to get to bed soon!
See ya.

From the Useless Fact of the Day...
On the Chinese written language, the ideograph that stands for "trouble" represents two women under one roof.

A Short Geography Lesson...

Good evening all,

Just resting up from our full day of Christmas shopping and now watching the Flyers let one slip awap to the NJ Devils. Presently 2-2 in the 2nd.

Anyway...

As you may or may not know, Kyle is from Fengcheng, which is in Yichun, which is in Jiangxi Province, in the Southeast part of China.

Geographically speaking, Jiangxi Province is home for 42 Million people (of the 1.3 Billion in China).
Here is a map showing Jiangxi:

Now, within Jiangxi Province there are things/regions called "Prefecture-Level Cities" (PLC). Yichun is the PLC, within Jiangxi, in which Fengcheng is located. Yichun is home for 5,100,000 people.

Here is a map of Yichun:






















Flyers are back up 3-2.

OK, then...Fengcheng is a "County-Level City" and is located within Yichun. Fengcheng is home for a lot of people (don't know exactly...).

Here is a snapshot of a Google Earth view that shows Fengcheng (and it's location relative to Nanchang which is the capital of Jiangxi Province.




























I've also added a few LINKS (over on the right side, up top) that might be useful.

If you link to the Fengcheng (Tageo) site, there is a cool feature that works with Google Earth.

Go to the link on this site that says:

“KML Export for Google Earth” on the left side. It'll open Google Earth and take you right to Fengcheng.

Let me know if these links don't work.

That's it for now.

Good night, all.